Content Warning: The following minisode contains semi-graphic descriptions of child abuse and other aspects of dysfunctional family life.

AUTUMN 2006

Over the town of Gravity Rises, snowflakes flurried in the air. They landed on telephone poles, on the tops of cabins, on the sweaters of residents as they hurried down the streets. They danced on the chilly breeze, drifting down on the grounds of the Northwest Manor.

Everly Grace Northwest walked through the Manor halls, nervously tapping on her leg with a finger. She was going to do it. She was going to tell him. It wasn't fair to him to ignore him like this, as if he'd done something wrong. She hadn't had the courage to explain before, but today she was going to get it over with.

Her task distressed her immensely. Multiple times, she instinctively reached up to her collar, expecting to feel her cool blue amulet there. Then she'd remember that it wasn't there anymore. It wasn't hers anymore.

Now, it belonged to her little brother, Gideon.

With Grace's recent eighteenth birthday, her bond with the amulet had dissolved. She had grown too old to use its power. And Gideon, only a week later, had turned eight — the youngest age to use the amulet. When Grace grew too old, Gideon grew just old enough. Gaston and Geneva had intentionally spaced their children out by ten years, so the amulet could always be in use.

Sometimes, Grace really resented her parents for that.

She reached her destination only to be presented with a closed door. With a deep breath, she knocked.

No answer.

She knocked again. "Gideon?"

Three knocks later, she gave up and opened the door. She respected her little brother's privacy — she was the only one who did — but she'd given him ample warning. "Charlie, are you in here?" She looked around the room. It appeared to be empty.

Uh-oh. She hadn't expected Gideon to be gone. He might be somewhere else in the mansion, but in Grace's experience, Gideon really only went two places: his bedroom and the forest.

She bit her lip. Well, three places, now that he had the amulet. His bedroom, the forest, and the Order of the Crescent Eye.

But he wouldn't be there. He hadn't finished bonding the amulet yet, and Blind Lincoln wouldn't dare try a memory session with an unbonded amulet. Way too risky.

Should she go out looking for Gideon? She checked other areas in the mansion where he might be, but came up with nothing. She asked a few of the servants, too, and they didn't know where he was. Seemed like she really should go looking. She really didn't want to tell Gideon the news, but it was better come from her than from their father.

With a sigh, she went to her room and bundled up in her coat. She didn't know the forest very well, but at this point she'd gone chasing after Gideon enough that it didn't terrify her anymore. She knew his favorite spots, and she knew the areas to avoid.

But this time, she wouldn't have her amulet to help her. She wouldn't be able to fly over the forest floor to quicken her pace. She wouldn't be able to defend herself from rogue gremloblins or annoying little gnomes who wanted her for their queen.

That was a tiny bit terrifying.

"You'd better be somewhere easy to find, Charlie," she murmured to herself. "And don't let me find you bothering the fairies again, either."

~~~~~

Gideon wasn't bothering the fairies. He was, instead, thoroughly lost inside a network of caves.

He rubbed the amulet with a finger, the way he'd seen Grace do countless times before. He still couldn't believe that he had the amulet now. Grace used it, it was hers — and now she gave it to Gideon?

"I can't use it anymore, Charlie," she'd said. "It's yours now. Remember all the cool stuff I could do? You can do that." She'd leaned down and whispered in his ear. "You can fly."

How exciting was that? Gideon had seen Grace fly before, and he'd been so jealous. She'd levitated him, made him fly too, but it wasn't the same when someone else was controlling it. Now he could do it all on his own.

If he could make the dumb thing work, that is.

He'd been exploring this cool cave, using the amulet as a flashlight, when it had suddenly gone out. Gaston and Grace had warned him of this — that it'd take a few weeks with the amulet before it would fully bond to him and he could use it when he wanted to. But Gideon had gotten so excited about the prospect of a new tool to help him explore that he'd come out here to these caves as soon as he could.

He'd had his eye on the caves for a while, but he didn't dare take a flashlight to explore. Who knew what Father would do if he found a flashlight missing and discovered Gideon's excursions? At this point in his life, Gideon was confused on what actions would result in punishment from Gaston. Better to keep everything secret and avoid as much punishment as possible. And now that Gideon had the amulet. . . well, he'd be able to fly, but he'd be chained to more responsibilities than ever. Responsibilities could result in mistakes. And mistakes resulted in punishment.

So even though Gideon was in the dark, it was better than home.

He took the amulet off his collar and shook it. A dark cave was better than home, sure, but a lit cave would be infinitely better than either. "C'mon, amulet, work!" he told it.

The amulet flickered to life. "Aha!" Gideon crowed. Part of him wanted to bail out now and leave the cave before the light went out again, but most of him wanted to keep exploring. So he pressed on, listening to the drip drip drip of the stalactites and peering at the rock formations in the amulet's blue light.

Until it went out again.

Gideon groaned in frustration — maybe a little bit of fear, too. Dark caves were inherently frightening, after all. He stood there in the darkness, shaking his amulet and hitting it against his leg as if it were a faulty mechanical device instead of a magical artifact. "C'mon, c'mon. . ."

It wouldn't turn back on. But. . . was that a glimmer of light in the distance?

Gideon squinted, adjusting his glasses. Father talked about getting Gideon contacts instead, now that he was "becoming a man." True men didn't wear glasses, apparently. For now, though, Gideon needed the glasses to see.

He also needed light to see, he thought wryly, but there wasn't any of that nearby.

But he was almost positive he could see a tiny bit of light in the distance. Another entrance to the cave, maybe?

He took cautious steps toward it, feeling his way through the cave. He moved extremely slowly — wouldn't do to faceplant it in the middle of this cave and fall unconscious. Then he'd be home late, and Father would really punish him.

Finally, he got the amulet to turn back on, and he sped up. He continued toward the mysterious light. Its hue was almost the same as the amulet's. It didn't seem to be sunlight, so what was it? A society of dwarves? As his excitement grew, his pace quickened.

As he went, he noticed little crystals embedded in the cave walls, sparkling in the amulet light. They were very pretty. They reminded him of Mother's and Grace's necklaces, except these were rough and uncut, peeking out from the rock. That almost made them more beautiful.

The light from ahead quickly overtook the light from the amulet; Gideon barely even noticed when the amulet light sputtered out again. As he got closer, he realized the light was coming from above him. A staircase of loose rocks led up to it.

He started climbing, curiosity raging within him. He tried to use his amulet to steady himself on the rocks, but it didn't respond to him very well. That didn't matter, though; he could do this without magical help.

He finally made it to the top of the rocks and found himself in an amazing little cave. Crystals were everywhere, all giving off light. It was like someone had split open a thousand geodes and used them to line the cave. No living creatures seemed to be in here, but a giant blue crystal floated in the center of the room. Definitely a place of magic.

"Woah," Gideon said, and the crystals gave him a muffled echo of his own voice. This place was so cool! What was this? What did it do? Why was it abandoned? Gideon walked through the cave, stood under the crystal, peered up at it from below. He was way too short to touch it, and he had yet to accomplish the feat of levitating himself with the amulet. "What are you?" he asked the object. "Why are you in here where no one can see you?" He felt privileged to have found this place; already it felt like a private sanctuary from his problems.

The crystal hummed, as if it were responding to him. Gideon wished he could touch it. It looked so smooth, so calming. He stared at it for so long that the glow seemed to grow stronger. It gradually filled Gideon's vision, so bright it almost hurt his eyes, and an unnatural wind whipped at his hair. Gideon stared into the light, even though it almost burned to do so. The magic in the room crackled on his clothes like an electric charge.

Then the wind died, and the light drew back. Gideon blinked rapidly to adjust his vision. That had been awesome, but. . . what was it?

"Do you want to see?"

Gideon let out a tiny scream and whirled around. On turning, he found himself faced with. . .

Himself?

"Woah," he said again. His own self stood in front of him — an exact replica with brown hair, hazel-grey eyes, glasses, warm clothing — except the amulet on his lapel was a deep orange instead of a light blue.

"Do you want to see?" his clone asked again.

"See what?" Gideon said.

The Gideon clone glanced up to the crystal, then back at Gideon. "What we can do." The clone looked at him with an expression of maturity quite unnatural on an eight-year-old's face. "We can help you."

"Who's we?"

"Do you want our help?" the clone asked.

"What kind of help?" Gideon wanted all the help he could get, but he was wary of this look-alike who referred to himself in the plural.

"Your life is in flux, isn't it?" The clone gestured to the amulet, which Gideon clutched in his hand. "You just received that artifact, but you don't know how to use it; your punishments are increasing, but you don't know why; your sister seems more and more distant; and so on. We can help you process all those emotions. Do you want our help?"

It was strange to see himself talking like this — well, it was strange to see himself at all. Gideon didn't know how this clone knew all this information about his life, but he knew that he did want help with everything. In stating everything out loud like that, the clone had reminded Gideon of all the problems he was trying to avoid. The huge weight of distress that Gideon had hoped to abandon here in the cave.

Well, maybe he could abandon it. With the help of this clone.

"Yes," he said. "Yes, I want your help."